n he heard
a footstep in the garden, and as he rose to look out Beroviero entered.
The master was wrapped in a long cloak that covered something which he
was carrying. There was no lamp in the laboratory, but the three fierce
eyes of the furnace shed a low red glare in different directions.
Beroviero had given orders that the night boys should not come until he
sent for them.

"I thought it wiser to bring this over at night," he said, setting a
small iron box on the table.

It contained the secrets of Paolo Godi, which were worth a great fortune
in those times.

"Of all my possessions," said the old man, laying his hands upon the
casket, "these are the most valuable. I will not hide them alone, as I
might, because if any harm befell me they would be lost, and might be
found by some unworthy person."

"Could you not leave them with some one else, sir?" asked Zorzi.

"No. I trust no one else. Let us hide them together to-night, for
to-morrow I must leave Venice. Take up one of the large flagstones
behind the annealing oven, and dig a hole underneath it in the ground.
The place will be quite dry, from the heat of the oven."

Zorzi lit a lamp with a splinter of wood which he thrust into the
'bocca' of the furnace; he took a small crowbar from the corner and set
to work. The laboratory contained all sorts of builder's tools, used
when the furnace needed repairing. He raised one of the slabs with
difficulty, turned it over, propped it with a billet of beech wood, and
began to scoop out a hole in the hard earth, using a mason's trowel.
Beroviero watched him, holding the box in his hands.

"The lock is not very good," he said, "but I thought the box might keep
the packet from dampness."

"Is the packet properly sealed?" asked Zorzi, looking up.

"You shall see," answered the master, and he set down the box beside the
lamp, on the broad stone at the mouth of the annealing oven. "It is
better that you should see for yourself."

He unlocked the box and took out what seemed to be a small book,
carefully tied up in a sheet of parchment. The ends of the silk cord
below the knot were pinched in a broad red seal. Zorzi examined the wax.

"You sealed it with a glass seal," he observed. "It would not be hard to
make another."

"Do you think it would be so easy?" asked Beroviero, who had made the
seal himself many years ago.

Zorzi held the impression nearer to the lamp and scrutinised it closely.

"No one will have a ch